


in the woods somewhere

by nightwideopen



Series: Winterhawk Bingo [7]
Category: Marvel
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Bingo, Bucky Barnes Bingo 2020, Dark Fairy Tale Elements, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Magical Realism, Multi, Past Character Death, Winterhawk Bingo 2020, Winterwidowhawk Fest 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:08:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26831182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightwideopen/pseuds/nightwideopen
Summary: The only thing Clint cares about is the aching sadness in his bones that won't go away, and that one way or another, the witch can help him.And if that means feeding him to a feral snarling beast, then so be it.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov
Series: Winterhawk Bingo [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1858948
Comments: 11
Kudos: 41
Collections: Bucky Barnes Bingo 2020, Winterhawk Bingo Round Two, Winterwidowhawk Fest





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CloudAtlas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CloudAtlas/gifts).



> this is technically a fill for cloudatlas' request for a winterwidowhawk drabble for my 600 follower celebration on tumblr! it got a tiny bit out of hand so now it's a bingo fill AND a submission for Winterwidowhawk Fest :D
> 
>  **Winterhawk Bingo square filled** : O5 (Guilt)  
>  **Bucky Barnes Bingo square filled** : B5 (Bucky/Natasha/Clint)

Clint has heard of the big bad wolf, the one that haunts The Red Woods. He's heard of the witch that twists the paths and shakes the trees to lure those who are lost into the jaws of her most beloved pet. But like all myths, Clint knows that he hasn't heard the whole story, but he also knows that myths often derive from truth, from a desire to explain the unknown. 

Even so, the only thing Clint cares about is the aching sadness in his bones that won't go away, and that one way or another, the witch can help him.

And if that means feeding him to a feral snarling beast, then so be it. 

He’s packed enough food and water for a week, packed a tent that he intends to leave behind. Clint packed his favorite sweater, the one his mother knit him just days before she died. He packed his brother's bow and his father's favorite flask. Clint intends to carry his family with him on the last journey he ever takes. 

It doesn't take long for the witch to find him, for the branches above him to bend inwards over a path that wasn't there when Clint went to sleep. But it's there when he wakes up, in the early hours of dawn, calling him softly, calling him home. 

There lies truth to the myth, to the song that’s gently sung as Clint tumbles along the new path— _his_ new path—bow in hand, arrow nocked. He's not going to do anything, hurt anyone; he came here for one reason only; but it makes him feel safer, reminds him of Barney teaching him how to hunt in the woods that surrounded their childhood home. 

Clint falls to his knees just after dark, in a clearing that's suddenly appeared before him. He doesn't know how he knows it, but this is the place he's been looking for. 

He's going to die here.

“We've been waiting for you.”

Clint doesn't have to look to know that the witch isn't actually here, that she's just a voice in his head, carefully hidden from view. He's nothing in comparison to her. He doesn't deserve to see her. Not really. 

He looks up anyway.

And just beyond the tree line are the sparkling flecks of a pair of eyes, staring him down, sizing him up, wondering which part of him to eat first.

“I'm here,” Clint says. “I need your help.”

“You do, little one. I can tell.”

The wolf steps into view, towering and silent. Even from this distance, all the way across the clearing, Clint knows that this wolf is twice his size. Three times his size. It looks like it's growing with every step it takes towards him. He swallows hard, heart beating violently against his rib cage even though this is what he wanted. He's still afraid. He can't take his eyes off of the creature, making sure he knows exactly where it is.

“What will you offer us?” the witch asks in his head, “In exchange for our help?”

Clint doesn't even have to think about it. “Whatever you want. Please. I'll do whatever you want.”

“James.” The witch is no longer speaking to him. And it never occurred to Clint that the wolf might have a name. “I hope you don't mind a slight change of plans. This one isn't fit to be a meal.”

And fuck if Clint doesn't take offense to that.

“No,” he objects forcefully. “Please. Please, just kill me. I can't do it myself, please I've _tried_. You're my last hope. I'll do whatever—”

A flash of red light is the only warning he gets before the witch is standing before him, tilting his chin up with one sharp fingernail and forcing him to look at her. No, no, this is all wrong. 

“Please,” he says again. It's all he can think of to say. He has nothing else to offer. 

“Hush, my darling. You have plenty to offer.”

Clint has a hunch that she can read his mind, but that can't be true. She can't know what's in his head and still say that he has _anything_ to offer. He's offering his life, his soul if she wants it. Isn't that enough? That has to be enough so that she can end his suffering. 

“Quit fretting. I know what you've done. You're not perfect, that's true, and your hands are far from clean. But that does not mean you are worthless. It does not mean you deserve to die. Your life is far from over, darling. And I can take the guilt out of you, if you let me.”

Clint chokes on his tears, on the witch's words, on her offer. 

“You can't. I'll always know what I've done.”

“Surviving isn't something you should feel this way about. Everyone makes sacrifices to survive.”

She doesn't get it. She doesn't _see—_

“I see perfectly fine. It's you who doesn't understand.”

The wolf appears beside her, towering over them both, and Clint can feel it both poking around in his head as well, watching the horrors he's committed. He wouldn't be surprised if the near-human expression on the wolf's face is disgust and disappointment. 

The witch tuts. “There is no judgement in these woods, Clint. Only survivors. You're one of us, you always have been. We've been waiting for you, don't you see? Don't you feel it? You belong here, with us. You're ours.”

The words rattle Clint right down to his bones, because he was right, at least. He _was_ being called home. The grass beneath him seems to caress his knees, the air holding its breath as if it's afraid he'll say _no_. He should say no, he should turn tail and run and find someone willing to put a bullet in his brain. But something tugs at him, something that was asleep in him that just needed to be woken up. The witch found it, wrapped her magic around it, and it stirred. 

“I don't have anywhere else to go,” he admits in a breathy whisper.

The wolf drops to its belly at that, crawls until it reaches Clint, staying low to the ground in a sign of submission, showing Clint it's not dangerous. He— James. 

The wolf lets out a pained cry that Clint could have gone his whole life without hearing. It squeezes his heart, batters his ribs. He reaches for the wolf, receives a wet nose on his knuckles in return. The witch hushes them both while she stands before him, quiet, smiling. She doesn't look worried in the slightest, red hair framing her unnaturally pale face. Perhaps it's the magic, perhaps he's under her spell of delusions. He feels as though he knows her. 

Her voice creeps into his head again. 

_Natasha._

“It’ll be alright,” she says gently. “Come.”

Clint struggles to get to his feet, his legs numb from sitting on them for so long. The woods are completely shrouded in darkness now, the only light coming from the witch herself where she’s holding a globe of light just beneath her blood-red cloak. It makes her look bioluminescent, inhuman, ethereal. It makes Clint want to follow her to the end of the earth. He thinks that maybe these woods _are_ the end of the earth. 

The wolf—James, he reminds himself stubbornly—follows close on his heels, nudges him when he stumbles, lets Clint dig his fingers into his thick fur to balance himself. Clint can still feel the witch’s presence in the back of his mind, lulling him into security, into safety. He belatedly realizes that he’s left his bow behind. 

“My bow,” he says dumbly, “It was my brother’s—”

Natasha looks back at him, smiling devilishly over her shoulder. “It'll be there when we arrive. I thought I told you not to fret.” 

Between one step and the next, Natasha disappears. 

“Wh—” Clint stops cold in his tracks, his grip tightening in James’ fur. But then his fur isn't fur at all and a man is standing where the wolf just was. Clint squeezes his eyes shut and whimpers. “What's happening?” he asks desperately.

A hand takes his. “It's a cloaking spell.” James’ voice is nothing like he was expecting, and it must be enchanted as well for the way it releases all the tension in Clint’s shoulders. “Protection is essential out here. There are creatures– beings.” They step through the veil together, and while nothing has changed behind them, there's suddenly a cabin in front of them. “They prey on innocents. They're older than us by centuries and wouldn't hesitate for a second to have us for a meal.”

“Prey on innocents? Isn't that what you do?”

James shakes his head. “Not anymore than you do.”

There's something real about James that makes Clint want to trust him, the feral snarling beast in him aside. James had kind eyes, a warmth and a nervousness to him that makes him more human than Natasha could ever pretend to be. He looks tired beyond his years, beyond his physical age, and he squeezes Clint's hand in his own. 

There's a light on in the cabin, a shadow in the window. A bell chimes overhead as James leads Clint over the threshold. It's warm inside, wrapping around Clint like a quilt and there's a fire crackling somewhere, but all he can focus on is Natasha, the witch of The Red Woods, making tea as though all of this is perfectly normal.

But then maybe this is normal for her, maybe this is how they prey on their victims. Maybe it's not a horrible bloody death by the jaws of a feral wolf, but a quiet death of sorts where they make him feel as though he belongs somewhere for just a moment. Maybe she's poisoned the tea. 

“Fretting is your second nature, isn't it darling? What do we have to do for you to trust us?”

Clint spots his backpack and his bow by the mismatched sofa. “It would help if you weren't poking around my head.”

Natasha smiles. “Very well.”

And just as noticeable as her presence was, so is her absence. She makes up for it but ushering him over to the sofa and sitting him down, handing him a cup of tea to warm up his hands. He takes a long drink while she kneels down in front of him and takes hold of his wrists, gentle but firm. It's like she wants to keep him in place, but only so long as he lets her. 

And he does. 

“Why am I here?” he asks in a whisper. He can barely hear himself through his busted ears. “Why won't you just kill me?”

Natasha's touch is electric, magic humming under her skin. 

“You're special. And you're good. And you deserve to live. I'm going to help you,” Natasha says reverently. “But you have to trust me.”

The tea isn't poisoned. 

“I don't _know_ you.”

James speaks up from where he's hovering across the room. “Yes you do. Otherwise you wouldn't have come.”

Clint grips the mug in his hands hard enough that were he a bit stronger it would crack. He's afraid. He's empty. He wants it all to stop and his last hope isn't his last hope anymore. There's a darkness that's been eating at him since he was a child, he knows. And the moment he stepped foot into these woods he was dead set on taking that darkness out of the world. It's a darkness that's engulfed everything he's ever loved, and he hoped, he _wished_ that he could finally snuff it out in The Red Woods but all he's found is… _this._

Two monsters in the woods who share his pain, his past, his suffering. They look out for each other. They want to take care of him.

They could be three monsters in the woods. 

“Please make it stop.”

Natasha doesn't ask again, doesn't ask if he's sure, but all of a sudden his consciousness is being shared once more and the voice in his head is no longer just his own. Bright red light shines behind his eyelids, blinding and overbearing and illuminating all the bad things he's ever done. Faces and bodies and rivers of blood, sadness and loneliness and cold, cold nights. Pain and heartbreak and loss of an immeasurable magnitude. Natasha's grip on his wrists gets tighter, her magic flowing from her fingers and _through_ him until he feels like it's his own. It seems to last forever, the torture of remembering, but it's over in an instant.

Clint's eyes fly open, revealing Natasha still on her knees before him and James just behind her, looking worried and pained.

He remembers it all still, but he doesn't feel a thing. 

Clint is a different kind of empty now. 

His entire being breathes a sigh of relief, but it feels wrong, somehow. Unsustainable. 

“You shouldn't have to carry all that,” Natasha says sadly. “The world outside The Woods is a cruel place.”

Clint stays quiet, so quiet that he can hear his pulse beating steadily in his ears. He stays so quiet that James ventures over to the sofa and sits so close that Clint can't feel the heat coming off of him. He puts a hand on Clint’s shoulder, a friendly gesture that might make sense if they hadn't only just met.

But it's been made plain what has to happen now.

“What about the world inside of The Woods?” Clint asks. 

Natasha grins devilishly. 

“Let us tell you all about it.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> now with lovely art i commissioned from [quicksillver](https://quicksillver.tumblr.com) on tumblr!
> 
> _[post link](https://quicksillver.tumblr.com/post/634176054223912960)   
>  _

[ID a painting of Clint Barton on his knees, his head being tilted up by Natasha Romanoff, who is standing just beside him in a long cloak her hair pulled away from her pale face. Where her hand is lifting Clint’s chin is pinkish-red magic glowing and spiraling upwards. Beside them is a large grey-ish wolf with a black muzzle. end ID]


End file.
